WordPress Plug-ins

The power of WordPress for Authoring websites resides in a number of places. The first being the vast variety of templates, the next and what we will be looking at today are the plug-ins.

One of my favourite things about the Internet from a support aspect is the fact that you can find the answer for just about anything. One of my favourite sayings is “If you have a problem, there is a good chance that someone else has had that same problem, asked about it on a forum and received a solution”.

The same can be applied when speaking of Plug-ins. Developers create these plug-ins based on their own personal needs or requests made on forums. Best of all, most of the time these plug-ins are FREE, some of these do have paid versions by the same developer which has more capabilities.

This blog takes a look at some of my favourite Plug-ins, I would say these are essential if you are staring your website/blog. In no particular order:

Cool Video Gallery

I have tried a few Video Gallery Plug-ins and this one so far is my favourite. It is fairly straight forward.

Cool Video Gallery, a video gallery plugin to manage video galleries. Feature to upload videos and group them into galleries is available. Option to playback uploaded videos in a Shadowbox popup available. Supports ‘.flv’, ‘.mp4’, ‘.mov’ and ‘.mp3’ files playback.

Disqus Comment System

Disqus allows your readers to comment by logging in with several services including Facebook, Twitter, OpenId several other accounts. It is very simple to use and configure. Managing comments also slots in with your WordPress menus.

Facebook Members

Facebook Members is a WordPres Social Plugin that enables Facebook Page owners to attract and gain Likes from their own website. It uses Like Box.

Fast Secure Contact Form

This contact form lets your visitors send you a quick E-mail message. Super customizable with a multi-form feature, optional extra fields, and an option to redirect visitors to any URL after the message is sent. Includes CAPTCHA and Akismet support to block all common spammer tactics.

Google Analytics Dashboard

Integrates with your Google Analytics account. If you don’t have one, get one. Google Analytics gives you a run down of all the stats you could possible want from your website.

Google XML Sitemaps

This plugin will generate a special XML sitemap which will help search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing and Ask.com to better index your blog/website

Komoona Ads – Google AdSense Companion

Quickly integrates your with your Google Adense account. An easy way to add advertising units to your website. You will need a Google Adsense account.

Redirection

Simply, this allows you to redirect pages on your domain to any other page. This is very handy when you are trying to limit the amount of 404 errors you get.

Simple Social Bookmarks

Social networking is by and large an essential part of any business & web presence. If you have a website, you need a facebook page with people liking as many articles as possible. The more people liking you articles & pages, the better your site will appear in search results.

Nick

Nick is an IT Professional who has been in the IT industry for over 15 years. A passion for technology & thirst for knowledge. A certified ITIL v3 professional, Nick is qualified & dedicated to delivering effective & efficient IT services with an Honest smile.